by admin
Another June 1st has arrived along with another hurricane season.
The last several hurricane seasons have been harsh on small businesses. According to the U.S. Government:
- 40% of small businesses won’t reopen after a natural disaster like a hurricane
- 25% more small businesses will close within one year after a natural disaster
- 75% of businesses without a continuity plan will fail within three years after a natural disaster
While these are sobering statistics, proper hurricane preparation can help small businesses mitigate potential losses and speed up recovery.
Looking at the 2018 Hurricane Horizon
So, what are small businesses preparing for in 2018?
National Oceanic and Atmosphere Administration (NOAA) forecasters anticipate 10 to 16 named storms this year. 5 to 9 might become hurricanes—1 to 4 being major.
Hurricane season began early this year. Before June 1, gulf coast residents and businesses felt the effects of subtropical storm Alberto.
If you’re doing business in coastal areas—even miles inland—consider your small business to be in the path of a storm this year and vulnerable to those U.S. Government statistics mentioned above.
Preparation Begins Well In Advance of Storm Warnings
Small businesses that practice a proactive planning approach tend to be successful and profitable. That Includes disaster recovery planning.
Check Your Business Insurance Coverage
Now is the time to make sure you’re well-covered in case your business is impacted by a hurricane:
Commercial Property Insurance for money to pay for repairs or replacement after a storm—including flood damage. If you have commercial property insurance, make sure you understand what’s covered and what’s not. Ask if additional riders are available to ensure your business is well-covered.
Business Interruption Insurance to cover the downtime experienced by a storm. This can help provide money to pay for rent, taxes, loan repayments and salaries. BTW, 66% of small businesses do not carry business interruption insurance.
Prepare Your Documents and Records
Would you be lost without your paperwork or electronic records on your computer? Make sure you’re well-prepared to conduct business away from your business location in case it’s damaged in a storm.
Inventory Your Business Starting Today to ensure your equipment and property is well-documented for insurance adjusters. Take photos of furnishings, computers and on-site equipment. Be sure to store the photos and records in a safe, off-site location.
Create a Grab and Go Container to gather critical documents and information regarding your business. Of course, this activity means you know where all of your critical documents are at a given moment. Prepare a checklist that includes:
- Name of documents
- Location of documents
Keep this checklist in your container as a reminder of what to take and where to find it.
Maintain an Emergency Contact List for employees, vendors, suppliers and key people critical to running your business.
Create and Store Electronic Business Record Backups on an easy to grab external hard drive or—better yet—a virtual off-site location. Many online backup services can continuously back up your vital records, providing you peace of mind that you can access your up-to-date data regardless of your location in case of an evacuation.
Include Your Employees in Disaster Recovery Planning
The safety of your employees should always be paramount to your business disaster planning. In the aftermath of a storm, those employees could be critical to recovering your business, becoming profitable quickly and providing them with a salary.
Create a Communication Policy that allows you to keep in touch with each employee. This includes gathering and safe storing:
- Employee evacuation plans
- Phone numbers of employee cell phones plus location where they are staying (cell phone networks can fail after a disaster)
- Email addresses—personal and business (consider creating a disaster-related email address for each employee on a free email service)
Delegate Your Hurricane Preparation
Sadly, most small businesses lack a disaster recovery plan. Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) estimates 4 out of 5 small businesses with 50 or fewer employees have not planned for a natural disaster.
Why is that?
- 34% of small businesses make disaster recovery planning a low priority in running a business
- 11% say they don’t have the time
Based on the business failure statistics mentioned above, disaster recovery planning should be a priority if you want your business to thrive after a hurricane.
If time is an issue, consider delegating. A Virtual Assistance Firm like Business Solutions Unlimited can help you develop a disaster recovery plan.
Feel free to give us a call at (904) 429-4588 to see how we can help.
by admin
Just a few minutes ago, an Indeed commercial appeared on TV showing job searchers how easy it was to find the right job on the online job site.
Big businesses with large recruiting budgets are finding success locating top talent on these job listing websites. They’ve done so primarily by sponsoring their job listings. Basically, they’ve bought ads on these sites. A luxury many small businesses with limited budgets are challenged to do.
Those paid ads get noticed. Sponsored job listings outperform free job listings by 3 to 5 times. While many of these job listing sites do provide free listings, a look at a job search result will show a multitude of sponsored ads before showing the free ones.
If your right candidate is looking for the type of job you’re offering, how do you get their attention when you’re on a budget?
Let’s brainstorm some recruiting methods small businesses with limited budgets can use.
Let’s Step Back in Time First. Are the Days of running an Ad in the Paper Over?
Many middle-aged and older folks probably recall combing through the printed help wanted listings and circling with a red or blue pen potential jobs.
However, times have changed. Many newspapers have migrated their help wanted listings online with many papers using online job site companies (Indeed, Monster, etc.) to power their listings.
So, if you have a job listing with an online job listing site, chances are it will appear on your local newspaper’s online job board.
For newspapers that still publish help wanted ads in print, they might or might not be worth your efforts. Consider the type of candidate who uses a newspaper and not online venues to look for a job. If your job requires a candidate with computer and technical skills, your potential employee will probably be searching online for their job.
Online Job Search Postings – Is this The Way To Go? Which Ones are Best for Small Business to Use?
Most of your potential employees will probably be using an online job search site to find a job.
If you’re a small business on a limited budget, job posting sites like Indeed and Ladders could be ideal for you because they offer free listings along with sponsored. Job listing sites like Monster and CareerBuilder start at $119 and $219 for a single job post.
If you’re offering a job under $40k per year, then Ladders would not be right for your listing. Jobs on Ladders start at $40k per year.
If you plan on sponsoring a job posting ad, Indeed costs 0.25 to $1.50 per click on a job ad. Ladders costs $6.25 per day.
If you proceed with the free job posting option, be sure to use keywords and search terms your job seekers would be using. This will give your job post more of a chance to appear in front of the right candidate.
Facebook Now has a Job Posting Option
In 2017, Facebook began offering job seekers the ability to search and apply for jobs at local businesses. That means the more than 70 million businesses with a Facebook page can post job openings—all for free.
Creating a job post on Facebook is easy. Click on the “Write Something…” field, select a drop-down option selecting the type of post you want to create (Publish a job post). Follow the prompts.
Your job post will appear in News Feeds of your followers as well as the Marketplace and jobs dashboard. You can also pay to boost the job post to a broader or selective target audience.
Facebook users can apply directly through Facebook allowing you to respond directly and schedule interviews.
As a Facebook post, your friends, family and employees can share the job posting with their network.
Is LinkedIn a Good Source for Positions Other than Professional Services?
LinkedIn is a great source to generate professional referrals for your job opening. Through their paid service, businesses can target job offer queries to qualified LinkedIn members—even those not looking for a job.
However, LinkedIn’s recruiting price can be very expensive. Small businesses might consider reserving LinkedIn for higher-end professional positions and not for administrative or clerical jobs.
Other Budget Recruitment Ideas
Consider approaching your local colleges, vocational and trade schools and ask professors and teachers if they have students qualified for the position you want to fill.
Also, add a Hiring or Careers page to your website. Many job seekers often will search job postings directly in Google and your webpage could show up—for free—in front of the right candidate.
Incentivize your employees to network your job posting in their circle. This could be a hiring bonus, night out with the spouse gift card or any other incentive you can think of.
If you’re interested in developing and implementing a candidate search strategy, consider using the services of a Virtual Assistant. We’d be happy to help you get your job posting(s) out among the best options where they would be found while freeing you up to do other things. Feel free to give us a call at (904) 429-4588 to discuss how we can help you grow your business.
by admin
As a leader in your business:
- Would an average increase in profits by 20% be of interest to you?
- How about boosting productivity levels of your employees by 17%?
- Would you be impressed If sales increased by 20%?
- Would a 40% decrease in absenteeism transform your business?
If those results—published in a 2016 meta-analytic study by Gallup—got your attention, then you might consider joining the employee coaching movement that’s transforming businesses around the world.
Business leaders who focus on coaching employees (also referred to as Employee Performance Development) instead of managing them gain a workforce highly committed to success—theirs and yours–vs. simple compliance.
“Make sure that team members know they are working with you, not for you.”
– John Wooden, Basketball Coach
The Difference Between Coaching and Performance Management
Performance management traditionally refers to overseeing the work of others through a one-sided, boss-administered task approach. Performance is typically measured through annual performance reviews where employees receive feedback from their boss.
Human resource experts question the effectiveness of this approach. Annual performance reviews are typically viewed as an anxious disruption by both managers and employees. Instead of inspiring action, the process can demotivate both managers and employees.
Coaching aims at influencing and developing employee’s skills, motivation, achievement and performance ability. The process provides on-going coaching and feedback to employees.
Sports coaching is a great example of the benefits of this approach. If football players received just a once a year evaluation of their performance, they and the team would fail—spectacularly. Instead, players receive continuous coaching on their performance at practice and even during the game. Basically, the players receive immediate feedback they can use to overcome barriers, challenges and figure ways to do better toward a shared goal—to win.
Some companies have dropped performance management and reviews entirely—in favor of the coaching approach. A Coaching Manager approach delivers:
- Enhanced performance and improved productivity
- Highly engaged employees
- Increased trust among employees and managers
Others use both methods. While coaching is a process separate from performance management the approaches can be mutually beneficial.
Because of the continued, throughout-the-year coaching interactions, annual performance reviews become more of a discussion and collaborative planning session than a one-sided feedback meeting. Both the manager and employee can look ahead instead of looking back (after all, you both had plenty of discussion throughout the year) to see what’s possible to achieve during the next year, then figure out together how to accomplish it.
“I’d say handling people is the most important thing you can do as a coach. I’ve found every time I’ve gotten into trouble with a player, it’s because I wasn’t talking to him enough.”
– Lou Holtz, Football Coach
How to Implement Coaching in Your Business
The coaching process is relatively simple to set up.
First, identify the key traits of your best-performing employee(s). You can conduct this analysis on your own, or collaboratively with your staff. This would help create ownership to the concepts uncovered during the session.
- Ask which traits or skills the employee(s) want to work on
- Mutually agree on skills necessary to accomplish the goals both of you establish
Next, document the tasks and activities that would help develop the skill sets necessary to accomplish the goals you and your employees establish. Determine if additional training, education or other items will help develop the employee’s skills.
Finally, establish target dates for the activity or plan along with a schedule for follow-up discussions.
Follow-up discussions should include a review of the accomplishments (or lack) of the activity or plan. Engage in a conversation that includes feedback. Then discuss next steps.
“Good coaching may be defined as the development of character, personality and habits of players, plus the teaching of fundamentals and team play.”
– Clair Bee, Basketball Coach
If you’re interested in developing a coaching culture in your workplace, we’d be happy to help you develop a plan. Feel free to give us a call at (904) 429-4588.
by admin
Are you a leader?
If you’re a small business owner, entrepreneur or an executive in a business or non-profit, you might answer “yes” to that question. After all, your position automatically makes you influential in the direction of your company and staffing decisions.
However, are you a successful leader?
Your answer might require some thought on how skillful you are applying leadership skills in your business.
Let’s First Tackle Leadership “Skills” vs. “Traits” or “Characteristics”
At first mention of the word “leader” who came to mind? Was it Winston Churchill? How about Steve Jobs? Maybe you pictured a parent or a favorite coach.
Most “Leaders” are defined by traits and characteristics. Great orator…inspires those who follow them…motivates those around them to always do better.
However, don’t the words “trait” or “characteristics” communicate an established personality or disposition? It can be daunting thinking that leadership is some innate ability seen in some, but lacking in others.
It’s not. Those leaders mentioned above, and countless others, weren’t born to lead; they honed leadership skills over time. Eventually, their active use of those skills characterized how we perceive them—successful leaders.
It’s our position that anyone can be a successful leader if they apply and practice the following four skills.
Listening
Successful leaders continually practice their listening skills. People, including your employees and clients, want to be heard. When you listen to what they say, you can gain insights that can influence your decisions that positively impact them and your business.
Listening helps to create a trustworthy relationship. When people feel they’ve been heard, they’re more inspired to follow your lead knowing you have their best interest at heart. A wise leader once said, “You have two ears and one mouth…listen twice as much as you speak.”
Active listening skills can be practiced in a number of ways:
Eye Contact: This helps the person speaking with you feel they have your undivided attention.
Pay Attention: Listen to the words the speaker is saying. Watch their body language along with voice inflections.
Ask Clarifying Questions: This helps the speaker know you’re trying to understand what they are saying.
Summarize What You Heard: This provides a reward to the speaker that they’ve been heard.
Decision Making
Successful leaders exhibit strong decision-making skills. Decisiveness inspires. Leaders generally don’t suffer from paralysis-by-analysis.
Leaders in business understand the urgency to make decisions and move quickly on available information. They also understand how to balance their emotions with reason. If new information makes their previous decision incorrect, they know when to decide to shift directions.
Decision-making skills can be practiced in a number of ways:
Be Decisive on Everyday Matters: Don’t dwell on what you’re going to wear today. Pick out your clothes and move on. Do you and your spouse experience paralysis-by-analysis on choosing a restaurant or a movie to see? Take the lead and make a decision.
Dedicate Time Each Day to Focus on Solutions: Got an impending business problem to solve, or a critical decision looming in the future? Take time each day to research pros and cons of various choices. Then, when a decision needs to be made, you won’t scramble for a solution. Your mind will be prepared to make a decision and take action.
Seek Well-Informed Opinions: See listening skills from above.
Don’t Dwell on Mistakes: Living or being influenced by past mistakes can lead to indecisiveness or paralysis-by-analysis. Learn how to let go and forge ahead.
Delegate
Successful leaders know when and how to delegate tasks. When a decision is made, leaders allow others to use their skills, talents and experience to accomplish the goals set out by that decision.
Leaders understand that delegation unburdens them from countless tasks that can drain their energy and attention. Delegation increases the effectiveness of their organization.
How can you practice your delegation skills?
Evaluate Your Needs: Assess your business or organization’s needs. Clearly define business goals and tasks involved in accomplishing them. Then look at your organization’s strengths and weaknesses to find if you have the resources to accomplish those task.
Learn to Surround Yourself with Talent: Bring onboard team members with the strengths, skills and passion to accomplish the tasks you need to be done to accomplish your goals.
Don’t think you have to hire a staff. Virtual assistant firms like Business Solutions Unlimited can be invaluable resources you can delegate your task to without incurring additional staffing costs.
Learn to Entrust Others: Evaluate the skill sets, strengths and weaknesses of your staff. Hand-off small tasks appropriate for the skills of your team members.
Communicate Clearly
Successful leaders communicate their message purposefully and with specificity. They never want their staff to leave their presence wondering what was communicated or asked of them.
How can you practice your communication skills?
Replace Lazy Language with Specifics: Remove the “as soon as possible” type of phrases with ones that convey specifics and leads to accountability.
Communicate with Appropriate Tone and Body Language: How you convey your message is often times more important than what you say. Practice speaking in front a mirror, spouse or trusted colleague to make sure you’re truly conveying what you want to be heard.
Speak Confidently: Learn to speak calmly and deliberately. Speaking quickly conveys nervousness and insecurity.
Remove Filler Words and Be Comfortable with Pauses: Words like “umm” and “ahhh” communicates that you’re uncertain about what you’re saying. Become comfortable with brief moments of silence—pauses—in your speaking. Doing so conveys thoughtfulness and mindfulness in your message.
Since communicating clearly is such an important skill for leaders, you might want to consider seeking professional training organization that can help you master speaking. Also, consider joining a Toastmasters International Club in your area.
If you would like to discuss these and other ideas to become a more effective leader in your organization feel free to contacts us at (904) 429-4588. Let’s all continue to be the best leaders we can so our people and our businesses continue to grow as well.
by admin
As the weather gets cooler and holiday season decorations appear almost overnight, our thoughts naturally turn to the warmth of friends and family, the joys of giving…and next year’s business budget.
Budget? Now before you go bah humbug and reach for that glass of eggnog take a few moments to read up on why you want to think about your budget right now.
Time of Reflection and Looking Ahead
The end of the year is a perfect time to reflect on what your business has achieved and to plan for new accomplishments.
The past year can also provide you with a good guide on your revenue and expenses—a roadmap for the next year.
A well-planned budget could make your business soar while a poorly planned budget could break your business.
What Should Go Into Your Budget?
Glad you asked. A sensible business budget should include at least four categories of information:
Item 1: Document Your Income Sources
Where does the money that you use to run your business come from on a monthly basis? Take a look at your:
- Earnings
- Sales
- Investment
- Loans
- Savings
Item 2: Determine Your Fixed Costs
This is probably the easiest item to determine as fixed expenses don’t change month to month. Examples of fixed costs can include:
- Rent
- Utilities
- Staff salaries
- Phone and Internet
- Bank fees
- Insurance
- Services like website hosting, bookkeeping, etc.
Item 3: Look at Variable Expenses
Planning for variable expenses in your budget is essential. A well-planned budget will include the ability to scale up or down costs of services or goods as required by your business. Examples of variable expenses can include:
- Raw materials
- Contractor wages
- Commissions
- Marketing costs, advertising and printing
- Transportation
- Travel
Item 4: Potential One-Time Spends
Planning for unexpected expenses is essential to a well-planned budget. Equipment breakdowns happen. Also, new opportunities can present themselves that require a bit of cash to take advantage of. Examples of one-time spends include:
- Computers repairs and replacements
- Furniture
- Software
- Vehicle repairs
Use Industry Benchmarks to Make Budgeting Easier
If you’ve been in business for a while, you’ve accumulated data that will make budgeting and forecasting less complex. However, new businesses might not have enough data. That’s when you look at what your competition is doing.
To be honest, a well-seasoned business could always benefit from looking at how their budget compares with industry benchmarks.
Industry benchmarks can provide you with data you can use to make educated budget forecasts – expenses to expect, income ebb and flows, etc.
It also can give you a good idea of what percentage of your budget should go to specific items.
Let’s consider marketing. The U.S. Small Business Administration recommends spending seven to eight percent of your gross revenue on marketing and advertising.
However, a benchmark check shows that marketing budgets can vary widely depending on the industry. A recent study by the American Marketing Association showed how much marketing accounts for percentage of business budgets in several industries. For example:
- Consumer Product Goods businesses spend 24%
- Service Consulting companies spend 12%
- Education companies spend 11%
- Retail wholesale spend 10%
- Healthcare 10%
- Energy 4%
Where to Find Industry Benchmarks
Simple searches on the internet can bring a wealth of information. The U.S. Small Business Administration also provides useful information.
If you have access to your public library, consider using ReferenceUSA. This resource is generally free from your library.
If you have any questions about budgeting, feel free to give us a call at (904) 429-4588. We can help guide you or even take an active role in creating a budget for you.
by Bridget Van Landingham
As we’ve noted frequently, St. Augustine business owners and managers are some of the busiest people we know.
Unfortunately, busy sometimes doesn’t translate to efficient. While juggling various tasks might seem the typical life of an entrepreneur, it can be tiring, frustrating and downright alarming when one or more tasks slip through your hands.
That’s why delegating tasks to a virtual assistant can be one of the smartest things a business owner or manager can do.
Recently, we shared the advantages of outsourcing.
As a follow-up, we’d like to share 10 tasks you can use a virtual assistant for to simplify your business life.
Keeping Up with the Bookkeeping
As one of the most important tasks for any business, bookkeeping is also one of the most avoided. It can be complicated, frustrating and interruptive. It’s also one of the best tasks to outsource. Let someone else take on your invoicing or unpaid bills while you run your business (or take a much-needed break on a Sunday afternoon).
Conduct Online Research
While the internet offers a wealth of information at your fingertips, it can also become a huge time waste. It’s amazing how the hours can slip by when you’re just wanting to look up some information. Virtual assistants can do the online legwork for you.
Research Prospects: Task them for looking up prospect contact information.
Research Business Opportunities: Have them conduct market research for a business idea or product.
Vet Potential Employees: Let them do an online search on employee candidates.
Keep Abreast of Industry Trends: Ask an assistant to keep up with industry news, trends and other topics that will benefit your business.
Update Databases
Your database of client information can be one of your most valuable assets. Entering data into it can be one of the most time-consuming parts of any business. What a great candidate for a virtual assistant. Take that stack of business cards from your latest tradeshow and hand them over to an assistant and have them enter the contact information.
Create Presentations
If PowerPoint presentations are a part of your business, outsource it. A virtual assistant can update current presentations or help you create new ones. Let them do the work of creating slides, charts and find the right graphics that will impress your clients.
Manage Your Emails
If you’re like us, your email inbox gets filled pretty quickly. Sometimes it’s a chore combing through your emails, prioritizing responses, even removing unwanted promotions. A virtual assistant can manage your emails with your guidance. Plus, they could respond on your behalf.
Adding the Personal Touch
Social chores are another important component to your business. Sending out thank you notes and holiday cards can add a personal touch worth its weight in gold. Let a virtual assistant take on these keeping-in-touch tasks.
Research Travel Options
Looking up hotels, flights, rentals and mapping out an itinerary can be time-consuming. Save time and let a virtual assistant be your personal travel agent.
Schedule Your Appointments
Large companies have administrative assistants to help manage executive calendars. A virtual assistant can handle this task easily. They can set up appointments, meetings and send out reminders for you.
These are just a sampling of tasks you can delegate to virtual assistants. We’d be happy to help you brainstorm ideas on what you can outsource. If you ever have any questions about outsourcing, we’re your experts. Give us call at (904) 429-4588.
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